The alleged victims were identified as Bruce Fromong, a sports memorabilia collector who described the incident as "a home invasion-type robbery," and Alfred Beardsley, who has been quoted by celebrity Web site TMZ.com as saying that Simpson later apologized to him and told him he regretted the incident.

Acting on a tip, police met over the weekend at McCarran International Airport with 46-year-old Walter Alexander, of Mesa, Arizona, who told them about the alleged robbery and validated the tipster's information, Capt. James Dillon told reporters.

Alexander was arrested Saturday night on two counts of robbery with a deadly weapon, two counts of assault with a deadly weapon, conspiracy to commit robbery and burglary with a deadly weapon.

He was released on his own recognizance and returned to Mesa either Saturday night or early Sunday morning, Dillon said.

In addition, investigators are seeking four other men they believe accompanied Simpson into the hotel room, Nichols said.

Nichols said, "There is a social relationship between the individuals that we identified and O.J. Simpson."

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Though Simpson is not accused of having brandished a gun himself, two firearms that police said were used were recovered early Sunday in one of three searches. Investigators would would not divulge where the weapons were found.

Nichols dismissed an initial report that the men may have been off-duty police.

"There is no truth to that whatsoever," he said. "That came as a result of some language that was used when the individuals burst into the room that led our victims to believe that they may have been police."

Simpson, 60, has acknowledged taking some items that belonged to him, but he has denied that any weapons were involved.

"Whether the property belonged to Mr. Simpson or not is still in debate," Nichols said. "We are still in the process of sorting that out."

Nichols also said that some of the property taken had Simpson's signature. But "there was some other property taken as well," he said. "I believe there were some Joe Montana cleats and some signed baseballs and other stuff."

The latest charges against Simpson mean he faces the prospect of another prosecution, more than a decade after the June 1994 stabbing deaths of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and Ron Goldman.

Simpson was acquitted of murder the following year. The trial riveted much of the United States.

But in 1997, a jury found him liable for the deaths in a civil case brought by the Goldman family. Simpson was ordered to pay the families a total of $33.5 million for the deaths

Goldman had gone to Nicole Simpson's Los Angeles home to return a pair of glasses the day of the slayings.

Goldman's sister, Kim Goldman, said she wasn't surprised by the robbery allegations, since Simpson "thinks he can do no wrong."

"He's capable of stabbing people to death, so I think robbery is nothing surprising," she said. "Normal, logical, civil-minded, law-abiding people don't storm a room with guns demanding stuff back."

Fromong had testified on Simpson's behalf in the civil case, telling the court that prices for Simpson memorabilia had dropped substantially since the 1995 verdict. His testimony was part of the defense's contention that Simpson could not afford to pay the Goldmans.

Simpson recently wrote a book originally titled "If I Did It" and had planned to publish it himself, but a public outcry led to the cancellation of his book deal.

A bankruptcy judge subsequently awarded the Goldmans the rights to the book in light of their inability to collect the wrongful death award. The Goldmans retitled the book, "If I Did It: Confessions of the Killer." That book just hit bookstores.E-mail to a friend